Seared

by Suleikha Snyder

  And I could feel him falling to pieces with me. Over the sound of the blood rushing against my eardrums and my own ragged breaths, I heard him swearing. Telling me how I was gorgeous and naughty and needy.

  “I’m going to fuck you so hard,” he said, fiercely. “I’m going to live in your cunt.”

  Half his promises didn't make any kind of anatomical sense. The other half weren't even in English. But I was past caring. I was flying. Thwack. Thwack. Thwack. The harder he struck me, the more amazing my orgasm was going to be. I knew that. He knew that. And he wouldn't give up until he got me there.

  I squirmed across his knees. Panted. Writhed. Crossed the border from pain into pure, sweet, pleasure. Lock. Lachlan. Mine. Forever.

  If I was going to kill him with sex, I'd die in the process. There was no way either of us was going to go it alone.

  Chapter Twenty-two

  He’d cooked for dignitaries, celebrities, and kings. Somehow none of that compared to whipping up something for one woman—the woman sitting at his kitchen island and wearing nothing but tiny panties and one of his t-shirts. It was a post-coital uniform he thoroughly approved of.

  “You don't have to put on underthings on my account,” he’d said when they finally decided to venture outside the bedroom.

  Naya had wrinkled her nose. “You really want my naked ass on your bar stools? That's unsanitary.” She'd sounded so much like Jyoti in that moment that he'd had a crystal clear picture of her in twenty years—curvier and softer and no less beautiful.

  But he couldn't hold on to that image, to that permanence. Not yet. So he focused on now. He focused on her cupping her coffee mug like it was the Holy Grail and trying not to blush every time his apron rode up.

  “You don't have to put on clothes either,” she'd pointed out.

  “Darling...do you want me to risk bacon grease in uncomfortable places?”

  Thus he found himself throwing together a frittata and bacon-stuffed French toast whilst wearing nothing but a “Kiss the Dom” apron an ex bought him one Christmas. It was all gorgeously, absurdly, domestic. The sizzle of oil in the skillet. Freshly chopped scallions. A little feta. A little Havarti. An appreciative audience of one.

  Ran had wanted to deprive him of this. For reasons Lachlan still didn't quite understand. Had his father truly hated joy that much? Or had he just despised his son and stepdaughter? He'd certainly gone to ridiculous lengths to keep them apart. Doctored photos. Video. Blackmail.

  “So, explain this cyber-hacking business to me. What do you mean to do?”

  Naya hooked her ankles around the legs of her stool, setting down her coffee. “I'm still working it out with Wil. But it looks like, if we can get close enough to Attwood, he can clone the contents of his phone. Then we access his cloud storage and delete all of his ammo.”

  “It sounds like something out of a spy film.”

  Her cheeks went as pink as her complexion would allow. “That might be where I got the idea. But Wil's the one who said it was possible.”

  Wil. Wilhelm Karlsen. Lachlan didn't know too much about this mysterious hacker friend of Naya's, but he couldn't help but hate him just a bit. He suspected he'd resent any man she spoke about in such glowing terms, her eyes shining with mischief.

  “Stop scowling, Lock. Wil's just a friend. He's never seen me naked.”

  Plenty of his friends had seen him starkers. But he wasn't about to tell her that. Instead, he shook his spatula at her. “Don't think I won't redden your bum again.”

  “Unsanitary,” she reminded, cheerfully. “And no using cooking oil for lube,” she added with a theatrical shudder.

  “Perish the thought. In culinary school we used Crisco,” he deadpanned, instantly rewarded by her pulling a face and giggling.

  God, she was beautiful.

  And his.

  He would never forget that again. Because the ownership went both ways. He was hers. He'd been hers from the moment he laid eyes on the teenage girl wearing her private-school uniform and a droll expression.

  “So you're the stepbrother.”

  “And that makes you the stepsister.”

  “Or the maid. Or both. You never can tell with rich people.”

  “I like you already, Naya.”

  “Oh, yeah? Well, the jury's still out on you.”

  The jury had come back with a positive verdict roughly an hour later, during their first joint expedition to Jyoti's kitchen. Cold samosas and homemade cardamom-ginger beer had forged a connection so strong that Lachlan could never break it. He'd been a fool to think it was even remotely in his power.

  “I'm sorry, you know,” he murmured as he plated up the eggs and French toast.

  “For what?” There was a frown in her voice, a touch of wariness.

  “For all of it,” he rushed to tell her.

  “Not for us, I hope.” He heard the light step of her feet, and then felt her lips, cool and gentle, against the back of his neck.

  “No.” His answer was swift. Unshakeable. “Never.” He felt her cheek rub his back. Her arms slipped round his middle. “You're the best thing to ever happen to me.”

  She tapped her head on him, like the space between his shoulder blades was a door. “Better than your Michelin stars?”

  He nodded. “Mhmm.”

  Now she poked him. “Better than the Food Network shows?”

  “Oh, yes.”

  “How about your cookware line?”

  “Darling, I can assure you that you certainly rate higher than a nonstick saucepan on a rack at Target.” He said it “Tar-jhay” because he knew it would make her laugh, and he was quickly accepting his addiction to the sound.

  So much so that he stopped mucking about with breakfast and silverware and just leaned back into her, reveling in the simple closeness. One breath and then two, and they were in sync. If he counted the beats of his pulse, would they be aligned as well? He had no doubt.

  He would do anything to keep this. Kill. Steal. And, yes, be a party to hacking. Naya was worth it. Naya was everything.

  With that in mind, after they breakfasted, made love and then made love some more, he did something he’d been avoiding for days: He finally rang his beloved stepmother—thankfully his only stepmother. He waited till Naya was asleep, fucked insensate, and rang Jyoti when it would be morning in Mumbai. Plenty of time for her to recover from clubbing, being seen, and causing a minor scandal or six. Her daughter might not want to hear it, but at 47, her mother was quite the MILF.

  “You,” Jyoti said accusingly in lieu of hello.

  “Me,” he confirmed, as he cradled his mobile between his ear and his shoulder and opened the door to the balcony. “Have you lifted the fatwa or what?”

  He felt her scowl across thousands of miles. The palm of her hand cracking his cheek, too. “Lachlan. Behave.”

  Two words were all she needed to bring him to heel. He winced. She’d always pronounced his name “Lakh-lan,” telling him he was her one in a million. To be so rare wasn’t a compliment when she said it like this.

  “I haven’t misbehaved precisely,” he defended. “There’ve been extenuating circumstances.”

  Jyoti made one of those judgmental noises exclusive to women who’d raised unruly children. “You hurt Naya,” she reminded. “And not in the pleasurable way. I should repay that sin, beta.”

  “Jewel’s already taken me to task,” he assured, even as his tension eased a bit at her endearment. Beta. Son. When he’d done nothing to merit that title except come along with her marriage to Ran. “Jewel and Chloe,” he added, leaning against the balcony railing and taking in the dark patch of Central Park amid all the city lights. “Not to mention Naya herself. Your daughter can hold her own, you know.”

  “I know. I made sure of it.” There was no mistaking the pride in her voice.

  “And yet she doesn’t know about you,” he pointed out.

  “She doesn’t need to. She found her own path.”

  “What if she wa
sn’t interested in the life? Would you still say the same? Kinky people do raise vanilla children, after all.”

  Jyoti was silent for a long stretch of seconds. “Even vanilla can be scented with cardamom, garnished with pistachio,” she murmured finally. “Naya was always marked to be a little different because of how I raised her. Kitchen to kitchen...set to set...country to country. Don’t wound her again. And don’t concern yourself with my secrets. They are safe. They don’t matter.”

  It killed him to hear her say that. In many ways, Jyoti had cut off a part of herself for the last decade—no, longer—just like he had. Ran had snuffed something in her. Gleefully. Wasn’t it long past time for her to relight that flame? To be herself? “Let it matter,” Lock urged. “Naya won’t judge you, and you’ll be free.”

  She laughed then. Weary. Stripped of her anger at him. Stripped of everything but the truth of what they both were. “Wait until you have children, Lachlan. There is no such thing as freedom. No safe words to end the scene.”

  “Do you forgive me, Mistress Jyoti?”

  “Always, beta. You’d be dead if I didn’t.”

  For now, that was as close to a blessing as he would get. And he was glad for it.

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Could you overdose on having sex and doing kink? If there hadn't been any cases before, I was certainly game to be the first. Sex was going to send me to the ER. Unless trapping Kyle Attwood and destroying Ranulf Christie's “evidence” sent me to jail first.

  “You aren't going to jail, babe,” Wil assured from the 17-inch crystal clear Retina display of Lachlan's state-of-the-art laptop. “I'm a professional.”

  “You're an actor!” Lachlan grumbled, still surprised by that particular revelation.

  We'd somehow stopped fucking like crazed weasels just long enough to answer a Skype video-call from Wil in Cologne. And I'd known what Lock expected: skinny, chain-smoking Eurotrash in clashing colors and Flock-of-Seagulls hair. Wilhelm Karlsen was none of those things. Half-American and half-German, he was built like his tall, Wisconsin-born dad, who'd played college football before joining the Air Force. And, oh yeah, he was an actor. A soap star, to be specific. One of the male leads of Ich Liebe, Du Liebst. The hacking was just a side gig. Something he'd picked up somewhere between Green Bay and Ramstein.

  “You didn't tell me he was so bloody handsome.” Lock had been fuming before I flipped on our camera and mic. “I work with some of the most beautiful people in Europe,” I'd shot back. “It's the job.” I'd gone on to point out that he worked with some notoriously good-looking people himself. Giada? Nigella? Padma Lakshmi? Come on. A job was a job!

  The scowls I was still receiving told me I was in for quite a “job” myself later. And I looked forward to it. If I was ODing on sex, it was as a very, very happy addict.

  “Naya...?”

  “Darling...?”

  A duet of throats clearing snapped me out the X-rated imaginings, and I was treated to two matching looks of impatience. Given how different Lachlan and Wil's tastes were, it was kind of hilarious. And I knew better than to speak of it to either of them. “Sorry, Guys,” I said instead. “I'm on board. I swear. How do we get this rolling?”

  Wil leaned back in his chair, frowning. “I could talk you through the shopping list and the particulars on chat, but I'd rather be there. I've already booked a flight and should be getting into JFK tonight.”

  “Of course,” my cranky chef snarked, not even bothering to whisper.

  It was cute, the jealousy. Though if he kept it up it was going to get annoying pretty quickly. I liked being dominated in bed, but my friends and my life were of my choosing.

  Testosterone tantrums aside, we all discussed the bare bones of a plan for a few more minutes before signing off. Maybe I was just being optimistic, but the men seemed almost civil by the end of the call. And when Lachlan drew me into his arms and kissed me, it was with passion, not punishment, in mind.

  “Are you okay with this?” I wondered, burrowing into his embrace.

  “I am all right with anything that removes Kyle Attwood fucking Esquire from our lives,” he assured.

  Even murder. He'd been willing to kill. I knew that. It was part of why he'd pushed me away so hard. All of that fear and anger and violence. Well, I wouldn't let him do it again—push me away or plot murder.

  He kissed the top of my head, my temple and my cheek. I knew we were headed back to bed. The sheets smelled of us. The air was heavy with sex. We would have to leave this cave soon and go back to the outside world. To everyone and everything trying to tear us apart. But not yet. For now, for the next few precious moments, we still had this.

  Each other. Dreams. Joy. And a blowjob that was going to scrape my throat raw.

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Sometime around mid-afternoon, they stopped to breathe. To regroup. To give his cock a chance to rest before he sprained it. Naya folded her hands on his chest and then rested her chin atop them, looking up at him with a question in her eyes. Several questions, if Lachlan knew her as well as he thought he did.

  “Can you believe we’re finally here?” she murmured. “Teenage me would never have considered we’d actually get together. Even though it’s all I wanted at the time.”

  This, he understood, was an observation. Not what she really wanted to know.

  “Did you ever...?” She stopped. Frowned. Clearly trying to find a proper way to phrase whatever was on her mind. When the words eventually came, it was in a rush, one breath: “Were you ever attracted to me back then?”

  Of course. Though he’d kept himself at arm’s length, always kept things aboveboard and platonic. “I was a healthy twenty-one-year-old male with eyes, and there were times you were so lovely that you took my breath away,” he told her. “But I had no intention of acting on my sexual urges.” It had been enough for him to just be near her, this delightful girl who was the antithesis of everything his father represented. Cooking with her, laughing with her, teaching her to mind him—as futile a battle as that was—had been the happiest time of his life. Attraction hadn’t mattered as much. Sex was a distant thought, a dream to be fulfilled later. “Even if Ran hadn’t sent you away. You would’ve been safe from me.”

  “I was safe with you,” she countered. “I think that’s why I pushed you so much. So often. I begged you for kisses knowing you would never give in.”

  ‘Never’ hadn’t been tested. They hadn’t had that chance. But... “I’ve certainly given in now.”

  She laughed, cupping a hand around the back of his neck and drawing him down for one of the kisses in question. Her mouth was as sweet and welcoming now as the first time, and he had no doubt that their last locking of lips would be equally honeyed.

  There was just something about Naya that called to him on a cellular level. Some intrinsic chemistry that surmounted all else. Though sense had overridden his lust a decade ago, he’d still needed her like food or water or air and keenly felt the lack of her while separated. He hadn’t called in all that time. He’d never emailed. But he’d talked to her just the same. They’d had epic conversations in his head. When he got his first New York Times restaurant review. His first Michelin stars for Calanais. When Food & Wine did a cover and a four-page spread. He celebrated every milestone with Naya. And he shared his failures, too—rare though they were. He’d never left her. Not really.

  “I always wanted you,” she whispered, shifting just slightly, moving her knees into place on either side of him. “I didn’t know what wanting was until I met you.”

  “Minx,” he groaned, notching his cock between her spread thighs.

  “Your minx,” she said, taking him into her. “Don’t ever forget that.”

  “Not a chance.” She was burned, branded and tattooed on his soul. She was more than a stepsister. More than a sub. More than girlfriend. Where she ended, he began. They made love fiercely and desperately, as if to own that knowledge...so they could claim it even when they weren�
�t in bed.

  And he did feel it, long after she climbed out to clean up and get ready for their meeting with Wil. She was still with him. She hadn’t left him. Not really. Lachlan had hit the fucking jackpot. Through no skill of his own. Just beautiful dumb luck dropping a gorgeous woman and her criminally inclined friends into his life.

  He’d been round the block more than once. He wasn't naive. He was a damn billionaire, for Christ's sake. He knew this perfection wasn't just rare but a miracle. Naya sleeping in his arms, night after night, with her bottom bruised from the flat of his hand was a fucking miracle. And before the week was done, they were going to pull off another one: getting his father's evil influence out of their lives for good.

  The sound of the shower going off broke into his thoughts. He set down the new menus for Calanais that he hadn't really been glancing over and looked toward the doorway of the en suite. She appeared there within seconds. Golden. Glistening. A few water droplets clinging here and there to her exposed skin.

  He wanted to dirty her up again, of course. But he knew there were limits to his endurance. They couldn't make love endlessly. They had to come up for air. They had to revisit the real world, where pants and trousers weren't optional. A shame, really. Because Naya was made to be naked.

  “What are you thinking about?”

  “The Pantriarchy,” he chuckled. She'd dubbed it that sometime during their sensual marathon. He wasn't sure precisely when. All the hours had blended together in a blissful bisque.

  Naya grinned, pausing in the act of pulling on the offending garments in question. Lacy underthings, blue jeans. A t-shirt touting the project of someone named Tony Rich. She looked young and fresh and bittersweet.